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If you were watching the nine o’clock news programme on RTE One last Sunday you’ll have seen some amazing footage of flocks of starlings flying above Belfast, swirling and swooping in the darkening skies, looking more liquid than solid, twisting and turning like ink dropped into water. Starlings’ habit of congregating in the evenings is most common in winter, and the flocks’ numbers swell substantially at this time of year, when birds from as far away as Russia visit Ireland. Some flocks have been estimated to number over a million birds. Despite the huge flocks that congregate not only in towns but also in rural areas, the common starling isn’t as common as it once was: in Britain it is now officially an endangered species, its population there having declined by over half in the last 25 years.